Batch transfer device for automatic packaging machines



Feb. 25, 1958 Y v. PEPITONE E 2,824,675

BATCH TRANSFER DEVICE FOR AUTOMATIC PACKAGING MACHINES Filed July 17, 1956 INVENTORS V/NCEA/T PEP/ ro/vs [A RL! 1/, CHASE United States Patent BATCH TRANSFER DEVICE FOR AUTOMATIC PACKAGING MACHINES Vincent Pepitone, New York, N. Y., and Earle M. Chase, Wilbraham, Mass., assignors to Package Machinery Company, East Longmeadow, Mass, a corporation of Massachusetts Application July 17, 1956, Serial No. 598,449

3 Claims. (Cl. 222-368) This invention relates to a transfer device for receiving and discharging unit charges or batches of comminuted material as in automatic packaging machines wherein a certain amount of such material is to be fed from a source of supply, measured and delivered into a filling chute or tube for packaging or wrapping operations.

An object of the invention is to provide a transfer device which will serve to receive successively delivered charges of comminuted or finely powdered material as at a weighing station and to transfer the entire contents of each measured charge into the delivery tube of package forming apparatus.

Packaging machines of the type to which the present device may be applied with particular advantage are well known in the trade. One standard type is adapted to form a tube from a web of sheet material, the formed tube commonly being drawn downwardly 011 a vertically -disposed hollow tube former through which the contents of individual packages are successively dropped for sealing between longitudinally spaced package end seal areas of the formed tube. The present discharge device may, of course, be used for delivery of measured batches in various other package forming operations.

In handling finely powdered materials of certain types in such packaging machines considerable difliculty has been experienced. Materials such as flour, cake mixes and the like tend to stick and cling to surfaces and to'become pocketed in corners and wherever the slightest obstruction to a free flow may be encountered. Furthermore, even when small quantities of the material are allowed to become stationary the powder tends to be compacted and to resist the resumption of a free flowing state for subsequent handling.

It is a particular object of the invention to provide a type of transfer container to handle such powdered materials for successive batch delivery operations without hindering the free flow of any of the batch contents and thus to successively deliver accurate full weight amounts into the package feeding chute. A consistent full weight discharge will thus prevent any overweight or underweight packages.

These and other specific objects and advantages will be apparent from the following disclosure,

In the drawings,

Fig. 1 is a side elevation with parts cut away showing a batch weighing and discharge device embodying the invention and in position to receive powdered material;

Fig. 2 is a view from the front of the device as shown by Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a fragmentary view on a smaller scale showing a batch compartment receiving its load;

Fig. 4 is a view similar to Fig. 3 showing a partially unloaded position; and

Fig. 5 is a detail view of the mounting at one end of a flexible container bottom wall.

Referring to Fig. 1 a discharge device is shown in the form of a wheel member 1 having four bucket or container compartments 2. The wheel member is formed with a pair of circular disks or side walls 3 and 4 held in spaced relation by cross bars 5 and 6 fixed to the walls. On its axis the wheel is rotatably movable as on an axle 7 fixed between the walls and extending outwardly beyond each side (see Fig. 2). The opposite ends of the axle 7 are journaled in horizontal open end slots as at 8 (Fig. 1) of a pair of mounting plates 13 fixed on a pair of hanger bracket members 9.

The bracket hangers, as shown, are adapted to be suspended from a weighing scales mechanism so that the wheel 1 may constitute the weighing pan of such structure. The particular scale mechanism is not essential to an understanding of the present invention and is therefor not shown herein. It. will sufiice to say that as the wheel is intermittently rotated by any suitable means (not livery when the desired weight is reached, to make a,

quarter turn of the wheel to unload the filled compartment and at the same time present an empty compartment underneath the trough for receiving a succeeding batch delivery. It will be understood intermittent rotation of the wheel 1 to turn each compartment from its loading to its unloading position may be under the control of a suitable drive means and the dwell of the wheel for receiving successively delivered batches of material may be assisted by any positional stop means as may be desired.

In Fig- .l the wheel is shown as removably mounted on the hangers brackets 9, the axle 7 being held against Withdrawal from slots 8 by a releasable latch hook 11 pivoted at 12 on mounting plates 13 of the brackets 9. The books 11 are overbalanced to hold the latched posinon.

Brackets 9 may each be provided with forward wall extensions 9 which are joined by a vertical panel 14 forming a stop board against which material being dumped from a loaded compartment may be guided for a vertical drop onto the inclined apron 15 (see Fig. 2) leading to the chute or tube 16 at the bottom of the hopper 17. The

tube 16 as previously mentioned may form the top of the forming tube of a packaging machine. The lower half of the wheel as will be noted is preferably positioned within the upper walls 18 of the hopper.

The sides of compartments 2 of the wheel are formed by the spaced vertical side walls 3 and 4. The bottom wall 20 of each compartment is formed by a sheet of flexible material hung between the side walls. The opposite ends of each bottom wall in the form shown herein are positioned at slightly less than spacings at the periphery of the wheel. The bottom is hung between the cross bars 5 and 6 and a preferred means of attachment is shown by Fig. 5.

The bottom walls 20, as illustrated by Fig. 1, are arranged to show a symmetrical appearance. It will be understood, however, that the strip of sheet material forming these walls is flexible and that when in the position of Fig. 1, only the bottom walls of the two upper compartments approximate a true picture of the suspended positions. The bottom walls of the lower compartments, hanging from their uppermost cross bars, would lie in loose array.

The sheet 20 is held in slack condition between bars 5 and 6 and the material employed is a limply flexible,

slightly resilient material having an extremely slippery, smooth surface. It is capable of sustaining a substantially constant trembling or quivering motion under the impact of receiving a load thereon. A flexible bottom of this type may be made from plastic sheet material known under the trade name Teflon comprising a sheet formed of polytetrafiuoroethylene. The sheet may be clear plastic or may be reinforced by a thin finely woven fabric embedded in the material.

The strip of material for the wall 20 is preferably attached at each end to the cross bars 5 and 6 as shown by Fig. 5. As there shown a plastic bonding strip 21 having both sides formed with a suitable adhesive surface for bonding to the flexible Teflon sheet is fixed to the upper surface of an end portion 22 of sheet 20. The bonder strip 21 extends beyond the end edge at 23 of the portion 22 and is laid against the surface of the bar 5 (the outer edge of strip 21 being at 24). The sheet 20 is then wrapped around the bar in a counterclockwise direction to overlie the outer adhesive surface of bonder strip 21 (as from the 10 oclock to 3 oclock positions of Fig. 4). It is then generally directed inwardly and towards the other cross bar 6. Adjacent the point of tangency a separate sealing strip 25 with its underside ad hesively coated is bonded to the under surface of the wall 20 and to the surface of the portion of sheet 20 wrapped around the bar 5. Thus even the unlikely chance of material pocketing under the attaching portion of strip 20 is prevented during rotation of the wheel which, as will be realized, turns each wall 20 upside down.

From Fig. 1 it will be seen the amount of slack in the flexible material causes the wall 20 to assume a more or less arcuate curvature under the trough 10. When the flow of powder is received from the dribble trough 10, the flexible bottom would normally tend to droop or bag at itslowermost portion inwardly of the cross bar 5. Inwardly of the leading end portion of a bottom wall therefor a series of spaced bottoming rods 26 are transversely fixed to support the bottom adjacent bar 5 as the load is received. It will also be appreciated that as the wheel is rotated during its quarter turn from the position of Fig. l the wall 20 of a loaded compartment in the area over the rods 26 will be supported in linear inclined condition to assist the flow and spillage of material over the edge of bar 5 and into the hopper 17. Thus the rods 26 prevent the wall from underlying bar 5 and pocketing any material by dropping underneath.

In the partial view of Fig. 3 the bottom wall 20 is shown in receiving a load. Fig. 4 shows a partially unleading position for discharge into the hopper 17.

In operation the slightly resilient, flexible material of strip 20 forms a mobile bottom on the slippery surface of which a comminuted material as cake powder will readily slide. It will be realized that as portions of the batch of the material are delivered from trough 10 the bottom being slack moves in response to the impact. The additional weight causes the strip 20 to shift and the powdered material to shift and slide over its smooth surface. The effect is one of the load quivering or trembling with respect to the bottom wall and thus a constant movement is imparted to the particles of the powdered material relative to each other and to the wall 20. This type of mobile bottom movement may at times be extremely slight but has been found to be sufficient to retain to a satisfactory degree the characteristics of a smooth flow in such material during the time it is being weighed and being discharged. When the wheel commences its revolution to an unloading position the shift in concentration of the weight of the material continues the slight but constant agitation of particles and thus the desirable result of preventing any tendency to lump or compact.

In Fig. 2 a pair of compartmented wheels 1 are shown, the particular form of embodiment as illustrated being intended for a packaging machine in which the package forming apparatus is designed to receive and package batches successively from two weighing mechanisms. In other words while one wheel is receiving and weighing a batch of material, the other is delivering a previously weighed batch for the packaging operation. The cycle of completing a single package requires but one half the time needed for the receiving and discharging operation of the transfer device.

What is claimed is:

l. A transfer device for successively receiving and discharging measured amounts of comminuted material to the filling passage of a packaging machine comprising a rotatable wheel having a pair of spaced circular side walls and a plurality of flexible slightly resilient and smooth surfaced bottom wall strips arranged between said walls and dividing the wheel into a series of annularly arranged container compartments, each said strip being held in slack condition between its ends at positions radially spaced from the wheel axis, said wheel being rotatably movable through a series of loading and unloading positions and at a loading position holding one of the slack bottom strips with its leading end at a lower elevation than its trailing end whereby said strip forms a mobile bottom for the container to impart a constant movement of the particles of comminuted material relative to each other and to the strip as the wheel is moved from loading to unloading positions.

2. The structure of claim 1 in which strip bottoming means underlies the leading end portion of each strip when hanging in load receiving position, and a vertical stop board is arranged adjacent the rotational path of the leadingend edges of said bottom wall strips.

3. The structure of claim 2 in which said wheel is divided into four compartments by said bottom strips and the ends of each strip are spaced slightly less than '90 apart and adjacent the periphery of the wheel, the strips in loading receiving positions thereof hanging arcuately between said ends.

References Citedin. the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,382,610 Streich June 21, 1921 

